Prahlad Prayers 4 Upward mobility can’t save us from mortality

Narasimha Chaturdashi meditation on Srimad Bhagavatam 7.9.23

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Shri Prabhupada ki Jai Hare Krishna we continue our discussion about the prayers of Prahlad Maharaj and we will discuss now in these last two prayers one about Hiranyakashipu and one about Prahlad where we contrast their characters this is now 7-9-23 Trishta Maya I have seen with my own eyes Divi Vibho Akhila Dishya Napanam Oh Lord Vibho, Divi in the higher planetary system there are Akhila Dishya Napanam there are all the controllers of the universe Dishya Napanam and the people of this world what do they do? the people of this world they desire Aayushiyo Vibhava Ikshati they desire long life they desire wealth, they desire beauty, they desire power all this they desire so now in this world people desire wealth and power and in the heavenly planets people have these powers Ye Asmat Pitu Kupita Haas Vijurum Bhidru but all those who have this Pitu my father Kupita Haas when he would get angry or annoyed and he would laugh in a sarcastic way Vijurum Bhidru and he would just raise his eyebrows Vispur Jitena he would actually cause the Devatas to be defeated by just raising his eyebrows Lulitha Ha that such a powerful Lord Satutej Rastaha you have destroyed him my Lord, you have finished him so here Prahlad Maharaj is driving home through his own example through his own observation personal observation the futility of seeking material opulence and material benedictions so he is talking about the hierarchy at four levels, first is people in this world they desire long life, they desire wealth they desire power these are the things which people consider as markers of a successful life you have made it you have arrived you have become a big person they say when? when person has a long healthy life person has wealth, person has influence over others now whatever we may have of these the Devatas have much much greater than that their life span is astronomical when we consider our life span they have far far greater wealth than what we have and the influence also they have is much greater now more than that more than the Devatas influence was the influence of Hiranyakashipu now Hiranyakashipu was a demon and you could say in today’s parlance you know he was a self-made man self-made man in the sense that he performed of course he got benedictions from Brahma but he worked very hard and he was phenomenally upwardly mobile people talk about upward mobility of rags to riches story but here he was a demon and he had not only not only defeated the Devatas but had usurped them and usurped them to such an extent that he had actually become he had developed such prowess the Devatas lived in mortal terror of him and just as if he would just raise his eyebrows in anger in annoyance everyone would cover away from him the Devatas would tremble such is the such was the power of the Devatas now the Bhagavatam says that how in the teachings of Kapila it is said that actually everything moves under the fear of the Supreme Lord now even the higher beings which has Indra and Indra and Surya and Vayu and Agni Yama they all work in fear now this fear is not like a terror like Krishna is not a dictator who everyone else lives in mortal terror of but this fear is a reverence reverence where there is fear that I don’t want to displease this lord so now basically when the Devatas are fearful of Hiranyakashipu that they become horrified when he raises his eyebrows in displeasure or anger thinking that oh what will he do he may destroy us so he may break havoc on us if he gets displeased that means basically to some observers it might appear that Hiranyakashipu had usurped the position of the Devata of the Supreme Lord so he had become so powerful so powerful the Devatas were afraid of him and yet this phenomenally incredibly powerful Hiranyakashipu Lord Maharaj says my dear lord in one moment you just destroyed him you finished off his prowess his position his life span his wealth everything you finished off in one moment so the hierarchy of power is here the ordinary people who desire material things the Devatas who are material things the demon who Hiranyakashipu who disrupting the universal order had a God the material things far far more than what people in this world have or even the Devatas have who had almost become God but then when the real God Narasimha manifested over there in one moment Hiranyakashipu’s position, prowess prestige everything was finished and therefore in the next verse Lord Maharaj will say he says therefore all the things that people in this world desire I do not desire them so we when we live in a materialistic culture like the culture today we are bombarded with images of worldly positions worldly gadgets and worldly pleasures and often these images they captivate us and we start desiring these things and in today’s society often the pleasure that is promised from these things is aggressively promoted aggressively glamorized but the downside that we may lose these things at any time and we will lose all these things at some time this is often not depicted or even if it is depicted it is not highlighted this is a sidelined fact of reality and thus we are blindsided by this selective and deceptive depiction of the nature of material world and the Bhagavatam brings about a balance by describing first the phenomenal prosperity and power of Hirenekashipu and then describing how all this power was finished off and that’s why for us to rise upward and upwards in the hierarchy of power that is actually is not a very point useful concept it is not very productive because no matter how much we rise we will be knocked off that pedestal wherever we are placed ourselves in one swoop of time and time is God himself as Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita Time I am the destroyer of all the worlds 11.32 he states so therefore rather than trying to raise ourselves in the hierarchy of power in this world we need to raise our consciousness to the highest reality and link with him in love and when we thus become devoted to the lord we get far far greater blessings our blessings that we get are inner and eternal they are internal and they are eternal whereas by trying to rise externally whatever blessings we get they are external and they are ephemeral so now after describing the external and peripheral the external and peripheral blessings that Hirenekashipu got in such an unparalleled way and how we lost them in one moment now let us in the next meditation on Prahlad’s prayers we will consider what is the blessing that Prahlad got thank you